Digging a Basement

Some time around 1947 or sor dad decided to dig a basement under our house.  Our house was small with two bed rooms, bath, living room and kitchen.  We ate in the kitchen.  With two bedrooms my brother and I slept in one and mom and dad in the other.  With one bathroom centered between the two.  For some reason it was decided to build the basement rather than add on to the house, that is an other story.  Oh I know the reason, a utility basement was more important than a place to sleep.

After consulting with a builder that lived around  Doreen Ln area.  Dad started the project. As he did everything he would do the work himself with guidance from a local expert.  In this case the builder helped build a conveyor belt.  I remember going to the builder's shop off and on while my dad consulted with him. One of the first dad had constructed was a couple wooden roller that moved the belt.  The belt was made of heavy rubber that was cut to length and two ends fastened together.  The belt was about a foot or more wide with wooden slats attach to carry the material up and not slide back.  A long wooden trough was made with the rollers attached to each end and an electric attached to the top roll to pull the belt along.  [Later this operation was used to put baled hay in the barn, but that's another story.]

First the entry to the basement was decided on. It was placed beside the back porch.  It would be an outside entry.  The main reason it was cheaper and it was a utility basement so they didn't want things tracked into the house.

Next is was necessary to cut a section of the foundation away.  This was cut the width of the entry door.  That required the purchase was a star drill.  He seemed to be proud of the thing.  It was a man's work.  Heck it was just a hardened steel rod with a cross hatch or star at it's tip.  It's purpose is to drill holes in rocks or concrete.  A sledge hammer was used to drive it into the foundation.  Once numerous holes were drill through the foundation in several places in he broke the pieces out. It was a laborious task.  No power tools for dad if you could do it in a cheaper more manly.  In truth the job was not nearly big enough to own a power too and rental stored was not available.  Power tools were really not in the hands of the average home  owner.

Once the foundation was cut away the digging began.   The dirt was put into the trailer and hauled away.  Much was hauled along Lower River Road.  Mainly along the north side of the road between our house and Rogue Lane.  Along the irrigation ditch.  It is still still there today.  No one ever said anything.  But then we were in the country in those days.  Rogue Lane was not.  The field on the north side of road was a hop field.

Each evening he worked on the project.  My brother and I did the choirs and helped dig.  When he came to a footings under the house the old one was removed a concrete block was put down and a longer 4x4 replaced it. The side walls were cut about a foot from the foundation.  To keep the house from sagging he would put a level on the joists and jack the house up until level then put shims in to keep it lever.   Things went well.  Well until.  Construction without a problem is not construction.  Anyway.  There is a summer high water table.

The project was started in early summer so the ground would dry out and the water table would be lower.  That was fine, but not one thought about summer irrigation.  Much of the Lower River Road was irrigated by flooding the fields and lawn with water from the ditch that paralleled the road.  There were also additional ditched that covered the properties away from the road.  We had a pipe that went under the road and provided water for our lawn, garden and pasture land.  No thought was given to the water table coming up with out the winter rains.  About mid August during the hight of irrigation season up came the water table.  It flooded our new unfinished basement with two foot of water.  What does that make.  Why it makes a very good indoor swimming pool

A swimming pool it was.  That is until mom heard us playing in the water our mother heard us.  She just came unglued.  She let us know in no uncertain terms that we were not to be down there.  The concern was the  wet walls could sump allowing the foundation to come down as well dropping the house into the basement or in one heck of twist.  So during the next couple weeks they were on pins and needles waiting for the water table to go back down.  It did once irrigations stopped and harvest began the water subsided and work began in earnest and with a since of purpose that fall.

In a short time forms were put into place and concrete poured.  No mixing ourselves.  Trucks came in along with professionals to make sure the walls and floors were poured properly.  Things went well from then on. Except the walls did leak some, but the floor by design was tilted toward one corner and some minor groves cut in to allow the water to drain to one corner were a sump pump was place to pump the water out.

A wood furnace was installed to provide welcome winter heat.  The kitchen wood stove was moved to the basement and we got one of those electric stoves.  Not new of course, but a good used one.

The basement was our place out of the weather.  It was a shop, furnace room,clothes wash and drying room, butcher shop where we cut and packaged our own meat of all kinds. We also canned fruit and vegetables. We even had an home made incubator to hatch chickens.  It worked, but purchasing baby chick was easier. Of course the furnace required wood so that is how Wayne and I spend most Saturdays mornings stacking a weeks worth of wood.

It was also a place to go do something when it rained.  The hay loft and the basement were our out of the places.  

But those are stories in themselves.  

Our First Bike

My brother and I got our first bike when we were about nine or ten.  Living in the country and being kids it was about the only way we had to travel.  Ah but more important it was the prestige of just having one.  It didn't matter what kind it was or how it looked just the ownership was key.  I say our, because it was one bike between, Wayne and myself at the time.

Our dad said we could own a bike when we had enough money to buy one.  Ya right.  We did earn money working around the farm.  But that was little and no where near the price of a new bike.  Besides mom really didn't want us to have a bike.  She felt that the Lower River road was no place to be riding a bike.  The traffic was fast and a fair amount of it.  So the edict worked for them both.  Dad didn't want to spend the money and mom didn't want us on the road.  Some where during a summer day in 1951 or so things changed. In truth I am not sure of the year, do remember it was summer.  

On that fateful summer afternoon Wayne and I were sitting in our backyard discussing the ways of the world with our friend, James Beed.  During the course of our conversation about the fastest way to cut down a tree, the biggest cow pie was in our pasture, I had really bad poison oak and other important facts, Jim announced he was getting a new bike.  A three speed.  Three speeds were the wave of the future.  Wow that's cool we thought, but the bigger wow was what was he going to do with his old bike. Of course you never come straight out and ask.  That would show you are desperate and you were never desperate.   After a bit of hinting around that we just  might be interested in taking his old one off his hands. You learn at a young age how to bargain.  You never tip your hand. Finally he  said he might be willing to let us buy the old one. Will is one thing, but at what cost.  He thought for a minute,  a long minute, as we sat holding our breath in a cool manner then Jim said five bucks. FIVE BUCKS!   With a sense of joy, yet with controlled  nervousness we said we would have to check. With a quick step we headed into the house to check our rat holed savings.  Moving with a fear he would change his mind. A deal was not a deal until money change hands. Even then it was questionable among kids.  After pooling our funds we came up with the FIVE BUCKS.  Asking our parents was not necessary, we hoped.  That deal had been struck when we were told that "you have to earn the money your selves".  The bike was ours.  We were kings that summer.

When we told our parent we had bought a bike that afternoon.  Their response was well-stunned.  There was nothing they could really say.  Dad did come up with a weak "is it safe".  Safe really met did it work.  It worked.  

The bike was an old 1930s or 40s fat tire bike.  Painted red with a tank mounted in the straddle bar. At one time the tank contained a horn.  Now there was just a button that did nothing.  The seat was big saddle with coiled springs.  Still the most comfortable seat ever built.  We spend many an afternoon washing, polishing and of course lubing the bike.  The various axles required oiling by a little clip coved port built in to the axle.  You lifted the little clip cover and squirted in some oil from a oil can.   The spokes always required polishing, because the oil would drip from the hubs and along with dust left a dirty film on them.  One trick for polishing the hubs or axles was to place a loose fitting piece of leather strap around it.  As you rode along it would do the polishing for you.  That was a summer to remember.  We were free to range much further than before.  We did do a lot of walking along Lower River road, but now the possibilities were endless.  Although we could only go one at a time.  Or one walk the other riding the switch.  It was not satisfactory but it was a start.  

 In truth after we share rode that bike for a month or so dad took me down to a used bike shop on G Street and purchased us another used bike. Then we were off to many adventures.  Riding to Riverside park to swim or to White Rock our favorite swimming hole.  We could ride to school at Ft Vannoy, or pick beans on the Upper River road.  Ride up Granite Hill to the railroad tracks through the cemetery.  But those are other stories .    

The Trailer

The idea for this blog started at my dad's funeral in 2005.    After the funeral my sister, Barbara, ask if I could write things down of my life in Oregon.  She is some what younger than my brother, Wayne and myself.  By the time she was old enough to remember many things The family had moved to Ely, Nevada and later to Roseburg, Oregon.  My life pretty much matured on the Lower River Road.  I tried several times to write it down.  But as many of life's event things start to get complicated as you keep recalling things.  Then attempting to cut them down to size.  Your choice is to cut it down, Grants Pass or a day by day account of events.  Then it hit me do a blog.  It does not need to be in any order except as events come to mind.  Stories will breed stories.
    
To help keep me on track while speaking at my dad's funeral I thought about a trailer that was part of our life's from the time I was born until it was sold in 2002.  By that time it had been in the family for 62 years that I knew about. A TRAILER!  Yep.  I am not sure when it was purchased.  It may have been used to help move my parents to the Lower River Road some time in 1940?

What I do know it was part of our family during World War ll.  Around 1942 dad was inducted into the Army Air Corp.  He was a Veterinarian so received officer's commission.  His job was to inspect troop food supplies and its preparation facilities. He did not leave the States.  Salina, Kansas was the furtherest east he got.

So leaving the  Lower River Road to fend for it's self off the Russ family went to war.  They loaded up the trailer and off to Wendover Air Base, Utah.  They found a home in Wells, Nevada.  We lived there a few months and then he was transfered to Monahans, Texas.  Loading up the trailer in Wells and off they went pulling their family goods behind them.  The next stop was Salina, Kansas.  However my mother pulled the trailer back to Grants Pass, Oregon.  Repacked suit cases and took the train to Kansas.   This all lasted until 1945.  Then we all settle back on the Lower River Road for the post War years.

The trailer then became a utility vehicle. When dad built a new barn it was used to haul supplies for it's construction.  It was used to haul dirt from a basement dad dug under the house. [a story there]  Much of the rock and dirt was dumped along the Lower River Road.  I suspect it is still there. He hauled pigs and cows for our farm.  Then some time around 1948 or so it was converted into a trailer to haul larger cattle.

 Originally it was built of 1 by 4s and ran on wheels with a leaf spring suspension and painted black. A little light for cattle.  So it was beefed up with 2X4 and 2X6s.  A drop gate was built so the animals could walk in. With a stanchion to hold their heads.  It was painted green.  The walk up gate could be removed so it could haul hay, manure, household good.  It was still a utility trailer.  Many a time Wayne and I used it as a manure spreader.  We loaded it up and then walked behind pulling it out on the pastures.  [ah another story]

We moved to Nevada in 1956. It still was used as a utility vehicle.  Buts the farm animals use was no more.  But then it took on the additional duties of a camp trailer.  [oh joy].  Many a fun night was spent unloading camping gear on our many travels. A  Disney Land trip camping in a public parks out of a cattle trailer.  We felt like kings, ya right.  I did like Disney Land and was one of the first people to visit.  But out of a green cattle trailer.

In 1961 they moved Roseburg and the trailer was still being used as a utility vehicle.  Some time around 1980 or so it was converted into a boat trailer and finished it's life thus.

Anyway that was my story that day.  So this is my story to day and have several Lower River Road stories out of this one.  Yes it is history.  and this is history.

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